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CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM. 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD, 



ON THE 



^yOFcoA/c^. 



ADMISSION OF CALIFORNIA. 




Delivered in the Senate of the United States, March 11, 1850. 



Four years ago, California, a Mexican Province, 
scarcely inhabited and quite unexplored, was un- 
known even to our usually immoderate desires, ex- 
cept liy a harbor, capacious and tranquil, which only 
statesmen then foresaw would be useful in the ori- 
ental commerce of a far distant, if not merely chi- 
merical, future. 

A year ago, Chlifornia was a mere military de- 
pendency of our own, and we were celebrating with 
unanimity and enthusiasm its acquisition, with its 
newly-discovered but yet untold arjd untouched min- 
eral wealth, as the most auspicious of many and un- 
paralleled achievements. 

To-day, California is a State, more populous than 
the least and richer than several of the greatest of 
our thirty States. This same California, thus rich 
and populous, ,is here asking admission into the 
Union, and finds us debating the dissolution of the 
Union itself. 

No wonder if we are perplexed with ever-changing 
embarrassments ! No wonder if we are appalled by 
ever-increasing responsibilities ! No wonder if we 
are bewildered by the ever-augmenting magnitude 
and rapidity of national vicissitudes ! 

Shall California be received 7 For myself, 
upon my individual judgment and conscience, I an- 
swer. Yes. For myself, as an instructed representa- 
tive of one of the States, of that one even of the 
States which is soonest and longest to be pressed in 
commercial and political rivalry by the new Com- 
monwoahw, I answer. Yes. Let California come in. 
Every new State, wWothcr ahc come fium ilic East 
or from the West, every new State, coming from 
whatever part of the continent she may, is always 
weicome. But California, that comes from the clime 
where tha west dies away into the rising east ; Cali- 
fornia, which bounds at once the empire and the 
f continent ; California, the youthful queen of the Pa- 
cific, in her robes of freedom, gorgeously inlaid with 
gold — is doubly welcome. 

And now I inquire, first. Why should California 
be rejected? All the objections are founded only in 
the circumstances of her coming, and in the organic 
law which she presents for our confirmati'^n. 

1st. California comes unceremoniously, without 
a preliminary consent of Congress, and therefore by 
usurpation. This allegation, I think, is not quite 
true; at least not quite true in spirit. California is 
not here of her own pure volition. We tore Califor- 
nia violently from her place in the Confederation of 
Mexican States, and stipulated by the treaty of Gua- 
dalupe Hidalgo, that the territory should be admitted 



by States into the American Union as speedily as 
possible. 

But the letter of the objection still holds. Cali- 
fornia does come without a preliminary consent by 
Congress to form a Constitution. But Michigan and 
other States presented themselves in the same un- 
authorized way, and Congress iraired the irregular- 
ity, and sanctioned the usurpation. California pleads 
these precedents. Is not the plea sufficient ? 

But it has been said by the honorable Senatorfrom 
South Carolina, [Mr. Calhoun,] that the Ordinance 
of 1787 secured to Michigan the right to become a 
Stfite, when she should have sixty thousand inhabit- 
ants. Owing to some neglect. Congress delayed tak- 
ing the census. And this is said in palliation of the 
irregularity of Michigan. But California, as has 
been seen, had a treaty, and Congress, instead of 
giving previous consent, and instead of giving her 
the customary Territorial Government, as they did 
to Michigan, failed to do cither, and thus practically 
refused both, and so abandoned the new community, 
under most unpropitious circumstances, to anarchy. 
California then made a Constitution for herself, but 
not unnecessarily and presumptuously, as Michigan 
did. She made a Constitution for herself, and she 
comes here under the law, the paramount law of self- 
preservation. 

In that she stands justified. Indeed, California is 
more than jusiified. She was a colony, a military 
colony. All colonies, especially military colonies, are 
incongruous with our political system, and they are 
oquolly oppn to coriupdou uiid e.\posed to oppression. 
They are, therefore, not more unfortunate in their 
own proper condition than fruiti'ul of dangers to the 
parent Democracy. California, then, acted wisely 
and well in establishing self-government. She de- 
serves not rel)uke, but praise and approbation. Nor 
does this objection come with a good grace from 
those who ofler it. If California were now content 
to receive only a Territorial charier, we could not 
agree to grant it without an inhibition of slavery, 
which, in that case, being a F^ederal act, would ren- 
der the attitude of California, as a Territory, even 
more offensive to those who now repel her than she 
is as a State, with the same inhibition in the Consti- 
tution of her own voluntary choice. 

A second objection is, California has assigned her 
own boundaries u-ithout the previous authority of Con- 
gress. But she was left to organize herself without 
any boundaries fixed by previous law or by prescrip- 
tion. She was obliged, therefore, to assume bound- 
aries, since*without boundaries she must have re- 
mained unorganized. 



Printed and for sale by Buell & Blanchard, Sixth Street, south Pennsylvania Avenue. Price $1 per 100. 



cm 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



A third objection is, that California is too large. 
I answer, first, there is no common standard of 
States. California, although greater than many, is 
less than one of the States. 

Secondly. California, if too large, may be divided 
with her own consent, which is all the security we 
have for reducing the magnitude and averting the 
preponderance of Texas. 

Thirdly. The boundaries of California seem not 
at all unnatural. The territory circumscribed is 
altogether contiguous and compact. 

Fourthly. The boundaries are convenient. They 
embrace only inhabited portions of the country, 
commercially connected with the port of San Fran- 
cisco. No one has pretended to offer boundaries 
more in harmony with the physical outlines of the 
region concerned, or more convenient for civil ad- 
ministration. 

But to draw closer to the question, what shall be 
the boundaries of a new State concerns — 

First . The State herself, and California of course 
is content. 

Secondly. Adjacent communities. Oregon does 
not complain of encroachment, and there is no other 
adjacent community to complain. 

Thirdly. The other States of the Union. The 
larger the Pacific States, the smaller will be their 
relative power in the Senate. All the States now 
here are Atlantic States and inland States, and 
surely they may well indulge California in the largest 
liberty of boundaries. 

The fourth objection to the admission of Califor- 
nia is, that no census had been taken, and no laws 
prescribing the qualifications of suffrage and the 
apportionment of Representatives in Convention, 
existed before her Convention was held. 

I answer, California was left to act ab initio. She 
must begin somewhere, without a census, and with- 
out such laws. The Pilgrim Fathers began in the 
same way on board the Mayflower; and, since it 
has been objected that some of the electors in Cali- 
fornia may have been aliens, I add, that all of the Pil- 
grim Fathers were aliens and strangers to the Com- 
monwealth of Plymouth. 

Again, the objection may well be waived, if the 
Constitution of California is satisfactory, first to her- 
self, secondly to the United States. 

First. Not a murmur of discontent has followed 
California to this place. 

Second. As to ourselves, we confine our inquiries 
about the constitution of a new State to four things — 
1st. The boundaries assumed ; and I have con- 
sidered that point in this case already. 

2d. That the domain within the State is secured 
to us. And it is admitted that this has been prop- 
erly done. 

3d That the Constitution shall be republican, and 
not aristocratic or monarchical. In this case the 
only objection is that the Constitution, inasmuch 
as it inhibits slavery, is altogether too republican. 

4th. That the representation claimed shall be just 
and equal. No one denies that the population of 
California, is sufficient to demand two representa- 
tives on the federal basis ; and, secondly, a new 
census is at hand, and the error, if there is one, will 
be immediately corrected. 

The fifth objection is— California comes under 
Executive influence. 1st. In her coming as a free 
State. 2d. In her coming at all. 

The first charge rests on suspicion only, is peremp- 
torily denied, and the denial is not controverted by 
proofs. I dismiss it altogether. 

The second is true, to the extent that the pres- 
ent President advised the people of California, that, 
having been left without any civil government, under 
the military supervision of the Executive, without 



any authority of law whatever, the adoption of a nation now is 



Constitution, subject to the approval of Congress, 
would be regarded favorably by the President, Only 
a year ago, it was complained that the exercise of 
the military power to maintain law and order in 
California, was a fearful innovation. But now the 
wind has changed, and blows even stronger from the 
opposite quarter. 

May this Republic never have a President commit 
a more serious or more dangerous usurpation of 
power than the act of the present eminent Chief 
Magistrate, in endeavoring to induce legislative au- 
thority to relieve him from the exercise of military 
power, by establishing civil institutions regulated by 
law in distant provinces ! Rome would have been 
standing this day, if she had had such generals and 
such tribunes. 

3d. But the objection, whether true in part, or 
even in the whole, is immaterial. The question is, 
not what moved California to impress any particu- 
lar feature on her Constitution, nor even what in- 
duced her to adopt a Constitution at all; but it is 
whether, since she has adopted a Constitution, she 
shall be admitted into the Union. 

I have now reviewed all the objections raised 
against the admission of California. It is seen that 
they have no foundation in the law of nature and of 
nations. Nor are they founded in the Constitution, 
for the Constitution prescribes no form or manner of 
proceeding in the admission of new States, but leaves 
the whole to the discretion of Congress. " Congress 
may admit new States."' The objections are all 
merely formal and technical. They rest on prece- 
dents which have not always, nor even generally, been 
observed. But it is said that we ought now to es- 
tabUsh a safe precedent for the future. 

1 answer 1st. It is too late to seize this occasion 
for that purpose. The irregularities complained of 
being unavoidable, the caution should have been ex- 
ercised when, 1st, Texas was annexed; 2d, when 
we waged war against Mexico; or, 3d, when we rat- 
ified the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. 

I answer 2d. Wc may establish precedents at 
pleasure. Our successors will e.xercise their pleasure 
about following them, just as we have done in such 
cases. 

I answer 3d. States, nations, and empires, are apt 
to be peculiarly cauricious, not only as to the time, 
but even as to the manner of their being born, and 
as to their subsequent political changes. They are 
not accustomed to conform to precedents. Califor- 
nia sprang from the head of the nation, not only 
complete in proportions and full armed, but ripe for 
affiliation with its members. 

I proceed now to state my reasons for the opinion 
that California ought to be admitted. . The popu- 
lation r,f thp ITnited States consists of natives or Cau- 
casian origin, and exotics of the same derivation. 
The natis-e mass rapidly assimilates to itself and 
absorbs the exotic, and thus these constitute one 
homogeneous people. The African race, bond and 
free, and the aborigines, savage and civilized, being 
incapable of such assimilation and absorption, ife- 
main distinct, and, owing to their peculiar conditiofl, 
they constitute inferior masses, and may be regarded 
as accidental if not disturbing political forces. The 
rulin'' homogeneous family planted at first on the 
Atlantic shore, and following an obvious law, is seen 
continually and rapidly spreading itself westward 
year by year, subduing the wilderness and the prairie, 
and thus extending this ereat political community, 
which, as fast as it advances, breaks in'o distinct 
States for municipal purposes only, while the whole 
constitutes one entire contiguous and compact na- 
tion. ,. . , • 1 

Well established calculations in pohtical arithmetic 
enable us to say that the aggregate Popu'a'*"" ?( Ijl^ 



22,000,000 



r<-' 



CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM. 



Th-»t 10 years hence it will be - 30,000 000 

" 20 do do - - 3-3,000,000 

" 30 do do - - 50,000,000 

" 40 do do - - 64,000,000 

" 50 do do - - 80,000.000 

" 100, that is, in the year 1950 - 200,000,000 
equal nearly to one-fourth of the present aggregate 
population of the globe, and double tke population 
of Europe at the time of the discovery of America. 
But the advance of population on the Pacific will 
far exceed what has heretofore occurred on the At- 
lantic coast, while emigration even here is outstrip- 
ping the calculations on wfflch the estimates are 
ba-ed. There are silver and gold in the mountains 
and ravines of California. The granite of New 
England and New York is barren. 

Allowing due consideration to the increasing den- 
sity of our population, we are safe in assuming, that 
long. before this mass shall have attained the maxi- 
mum of numbers indicated, the entire width of our 
possessions from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean 
will be covered by it, ind be brought into social ma- 
turity and complete political organization. 

The question now arises. Shall this one great 
people, having a common origin, a common lan- 
guage, a common religion, com.mon sentiments, in- 
terests, sympathies, and hopes, remain one political 
State, one nation, one repulDiic, or shall it be broken 
into two conflicting and probably hostile nations or 
republics? There cannot ultimately be more than 
two. For the habit of association is already formed, 
as the interests of mutual intercourse arebeing formed. 
It is already ascertained where the centre of politi- 
cal power must rest. It must rest in the agricultural 
interests and masses, who will occupy the interior of 
the continent. These masses, if they cannot all 
command access to both oceans, will not be obstruct- 
ed in their approaches to that one, which offers the 
greatest facihties to their commerce. 

Shall the American people, then, be divided? Be- 
fore deciding on this question, let us consider our 
position, our power, and capabilities. 

The world contains no seat of emoire so magnifi- 
cent as this ; which, while it embraces all the vary- 
ing climates of the temperate zone, and is traversed 
by wide expanding lakes and long-branching rivers, 
offers supplies on the Atlantic shores to the over- 
crowded nations of Europe, while on the Pacific 
coast it intercepts the commerce of the Indies. The 
nation thus situated, and enjoying forest, mineral, 
and agricultural resources unequalled, if endowed 
also with moral energies adequate to the achievement 
of great enterprises and favored with a Government 
adapted to their character and condition, must com- 
mand the empire of the seas, which alone is real em- 
pire. 

We think, that we may claim to have inherited 
physical and intellectual vigor, courage, invention, 
and enterprise; and the systems of education pre- 
vailing among us open to all the stores of human 
science and art. 

The old world and the past were allotted by Prov- 
idence to the pupilage of mankind, under the hard 
discipline of arbitrary power, quelling the violence of 
human passions. The new world and the future 
seem to have been appointed for the maturity of 
mankind, with the development of self-trovernment 
operating in obedience to reason and judgment. 

We have thoroughly tried our novel system of 
Democratic Federal Government, with its complex, 
yet harmonious and efiective combination of distinct 
local elective agencies, for the conduct of domestic 
affairs, and its common central elective agencies, for 
the regulation of internal interests and of intercourse 
with foreign nations ; and we know, that it is a sys- 
tem equally cohesive in its parts, and capable of all 
desirable expansion ; and that it is a system, more- 



over, perfectly adapted to secure domestic tranquillity, 
while it brings into activity all the elements of 
national aggrandizement. The Atlantic States, 
through their commercial, social, and political affin- 
ities and sympathies, are steadily renovating the 
Governments and the social constitutions of Europe 
and of Africa. The Pacific States must necessarily 
perform the same sublime and beneficent functions 
in Asia. If, then, the American people shall remain 
an undivided nation, the ripening civilization of the 
West, after a separation growing wider and wider 
for four thousand years, will, in its circuit of the 
world, meet again and mingle with the declining 
civilization of the East on our own free soil, and a 
new and more perfect civilization will arise to bless 
the earth, under the sway of our own cherished and 
beneficent democratic institutions. 

We may then reasonably hope for greatness, felici- 
ty, and renown, excelling any hitherto attained by 
any nation, if, standing firmly on the continent, we 
loose not our grasp on the shore of either ocean. 
Whether a destiny so magnificent would oe only par- 
tially defeated, or whether it would be altogether lost 
by a relaxation of that grasp, surpasses our wisdom 
to determine, and happily it is not important tobede- 
termined. It is enough, if we agree that expectations 
so grand, yet so reasonable and so just, ought not to 
be in any degree disappointed. 

And now it seems to me, that the perpetual unity 
of our empire hangs on the decision of this day and 
of this hour. 

California is already a State, a complete and fully 
appointed Sta'e. She never again can be less than 
that. She can never again be a province or a colo- 
ny ; nor can she be made to shrink and shrivel into 
the proportions of a federal dependent Terrritory. 
California, then, henceforth and forever, must be, 
what she is now, a State. 

The question whether she shall be one of the United 
States of America has depended on her and on us. 
Hor election has been made. Our consent alone re- 
mainssuspended; and that consent mustbe pronounc- 
ed now or never. I say now or never. Nothing pre- 
ventsit now, butwant ofagreement among ourselves. 
Our harmony cannot increase while this question re- 
mains open. We shall never agree to admit Califor- 
nia, unless we agree now. Nor will California abide 
delay. 1 do not say that she contemplates indepen- 
dence ; but, if she does not, it is because she does 
not anticipate rejection. Do you say that she can 
have no motive ? Consider, then, her attitude if re- 
jected. She needs a constitution, a legislature, and 
magistrates ; she needs titles to that golden domain 
of ours within her borders ; good titles, too ; and you 
must give them on your own terms, or she must 
take them without your leave. She needs a mint, a 
custom-house, wharves, hospitals, and institutions of 
learning'; she needs fortifications, and roads, and 
railroads; she needs the protection of an army and 
a navy ; either your stars and stripes must wave over 
her ports and her fleets, or she must raise aloft a 
standard for herself; she needs, at least, to know 
whether you are friends or enemies; and, finally, she 
needs what no American community can live with- 
out, sovereignty and independence — either a just and 
equal share of yours, or sovereignty and independence 
of her own. 

Will you say that California could not aggrandize 
herself "by separation? Would it, then, be a mean 
ambition to set up within fifty years, on the Pacific 
coast, monuments like those which we think two 
hundred years have been well spent in establishing 
on the Atlantic coast? 

Will you say that California has no ability to be- 
come independent ? She has the same moral abil- 
ity for enterprise that inheres in us, and that ability 
implies command of all physical means. She has 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



advantages of position. She is practically further 
removed from you than England. You cannot 
reach her by railroad, nor by unbroken steam navi- 
gation. You can send no armies over the prairie, 
the mountain, and the desert, nor across the remote 
and narrow Isthmus within a foreign jurisdiction, 
nor around the Cape of Storms. You may send a 
navy there, but she has only to open her mines, and 
she can seduce your navies and appropriate vour 
floating bulwarks to her own defence. Let her only 
seize your domain within her borders, and your 
commerce in her ports, and she will have at 
once revenues and credit adequate to all her necessi- 
ties. Besides, are we so moderate, and has the 
world become so just, that we have no rivals and no 
enemies to lend their sympathies and aid to com- 
pass the dismemberment of our empire? 

Try not the temper and fidelitv of California— at 
least not now, not yet. Cherish her and indulge her 
until you have extended your settlements to her 
borders, and bound her last by railroads, and canals, 
and telegraphs, to your interests— until her affinities 
of intercourse are established, and habits of loyalty 
are fixed— and then she can never be disengaged. 

California would not go alone. Oregon, so inti- 
mately allied to her, and as yet so loosely attached to 
us, would go also; and then at least the entire Pa- 
cific coast, with the western declivity of the Sierra 
Nevada, would be lost. It would not depend at all 
upon us, nor even on the mere forbearance of Cali- 
fornia, l>ow far eastward the long line across the 
temperate zone should be drawn, which should sep- 
arate (he Republic of the Pacific from the Republic 
of the Atlantic. Terminus has passed awav with 
all the deiiies of the ancient Pantheon, but hi's scep- 
tre remains. Commerce is the god of boundaries, 
and no man now living can foretell his ultimate de- 
cree. 

But it is insisted that the admission of California 
shall be attended by a compromise of questions 
which have arisen out of slavery ! 

I AM OPPOSED TO ANY SUCH COMPROMISE, IN ANY 
AND ALL THE FORMS IN WHICH IT HAS BEEN PROPOSED. 

Because.whileadmitting the purity and the patriotism 
of all from whom it is my misfortune to differ, I 
think all legislative compromises radically wrong and 
essentially vicious. They involve the surrender of 
the exercise of judgment and conscience on distinct 
and separate questions, at distinct and separate 
times, with the indispensable advantages it affords 
for ascertaining truth. They involve a relinquish- 
ment of the right to reconsider in future the decis- 
ions of the present, on questions prematurely an- 
ticipated. And they are a usurpation as lo future 
questions of the province of future legislators. 

Sir, it seems to me, as if slavery had laid its par- 
alyzing hand upon myself, and the blood were cours- 
ing less freely than its wont through my veins, 
when I endeavor to suppose that such a compro- 
mise has been effected, and my utiernnce forever is 
arrested upon all the great questions, social, moral, 
and political, arising out of a subject so important, 
and as yet so incomprehensible. What nm I to receive 
in this compromise 7 Freedom in California. It is 
well; it is a noble acquisition; it is worth a sacri- 
fice. But what am 1 to give as an equivalent 1 
A recognition of the claim to perpetuate slavery in 
the District of Columbia; forbearance towards more 
stringent laws concerning the arrest of persons sus- 
pected of being slaves found in the free States ; for- 
bearance from the Proviso of freedom in the char- 
ters of new Territories. None of the plans of com- 
promise offered demand less than two, and most of 
them insist on all of these conditions. The equiv- 
alent tliun is, some portion of lib:rty, some portion 
of human rights in one region for liberty in another 
region. But California brings gold and commerce 



as well as freedom. I am, then, to surrendei ■^•ome 
portion of human freedom in the District of Colum- 
bia, and in East California and New Mexico, for the 
mixed consideration of liberty, gold, and power, on 
the Pacific coast. 

This view of legislative compromises is not neit. 
It has widely prevailed, and many of the State Con- 
stitutions interdict the introduction of more than 
one subject into one bill submitted for legislative ac- 
tion. 

It was of such compromises that Burke said, in 
one of the loftiest bufsts of even his majestic par- 
liamentary eloquence : 

" Far, far from the Commons of Great Britain be all man- 
ner of real vice ; but ten thousand times farther from them, 
as far as from pole to pole, be tlic whole tribe of spurious, 
affected, counterfeit and hypocritical virtues ! These are 
the things which are ten thousand times more at war with 
real virtue; these are the Ihin£;s which are ten thousand 
times more at war with real duty, than any vice known iiy 
its name and distinguished by its proper character. 

" Far, far from us be that lalse and affected candor that 
is eternally in treaty w.th crime— that half virtue, which, 
like the ambiguous animal tliat liies about in the twilight 
of a compromise between day and night, is, to a just man's 
eye, an odious and disgusting thing. There is no middle 
point, my Lords, in which the Commons of Great Britain 
can meet tyranny and oppression." 

But, sir, if I could overcome my repugnance to 
compromises in general, I should object to this one, 
on the ground of tlie inequality and incongruity of 
the interests to be compromised. Why, sir, ac- 
cording to the views I have submitted, California 
ought to come in, and must come in, whether sla 
very stands or falls in the District of Columbia; 
whether slavery stands or falls in New Mexico and 
Eastern California ; and even whether slavery 
stands or falls in the slave States. California ought 
to come in, being a free State ; and, under the cir- 
cumstances of her conquest, her compact, her aban- 
donment, her justifiable and necessary establishment 
of a Constitution, and the inevitable dismemberment 
of the empire consequent upon her rejection, I 
should have voted for her admission even if she 
had come as a slave State. California ought to 
come in, and must come in at all events. It is, 
then, an independent, a paramount question. What, 
then, are these questions arising out of slavery, 
thus interposed, but collateral questions ? They are 
unnecessary and incongruous, and therefore false 
issues, not introduced designedly, indeed, to defeat 
that great policy, yet unavoidably tending to that 
end. 

Mr. FOOTE. Will the honorable Senator allow 
me to ask him, if the Senate is lo understand him 
as saying tliat he would vote for the admission of 
California if she came here seeking admission as a 
slave State. 

Mr. SEWARD. I reply, as I said before, that 
even if California had come as a slave State, yet 
coming under the extraordinary ciicums'ances I have 
described, and in view of the consequences of a dis- 
memberment of the empire, consequent upon her 
rejection, I should have voted for her admission, 
even though she had come as a slave State. But I 
should not have voted for her admission otherwise. 

I remark in the next place, that consent on my 
part would be disingenuous and fraudulent, because 
the compromise would be unavailing. 

It is now avowed by the honorable Senator from 
South Carolina, [Mr. Calhoun,] that nothing will 
satisfy the slave States but a compromise thai will 
convince them that they can remain in the Union 
consistently with their honor and their safety. 
And what are the concessions which will have that 
effect ? Here they are, in the words of that Senator : 

" The North must do justice by conceding to the S'.^uth 
an equal right in the acquired territory, and do her duty 



CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM 



by causing the stipulations relative to fusitive slaves to be 
faitiifully fulfilled — cease the agitation of the slave ques- 
tion, anil provide for the insertion of a provision in tre 
Constitution, by an amendment, which will restore to the 
South in substance the power she possessed of protec\ing 
herself, before the equilibrium between the sections was 
destroyed by the action of this Government.-' 

These terms amount to this, that the free States 
having already, or although they may hereafter have, 
majorities of Slates, majorities of population, and 
majorities in both Houses of Congress, shall con- 
cede to the slave States, being in a niinority in both, 
the unequal advantage of an equality. That is, that 
we shall alter the Constitution so as to convert the 
GoverniTient from a national democracy, operating 
by a constitutional majority of voices, into a federal 
alliance, in which the minority shall have a veto 
against the majority. And this is to return to the 
original articles of confederation. 

I will not stop to protest against the injustice or 
the inexpediency of an innovation which, if it was 
practicable, would be so entirely subversive of the 
principle of democratic institutions. It is enough 
to say that it is totally impracticable. The free 
States, Northern and Western, acquiesced in the 
long and nearly unbroken ascendancy of the slave 
States under the Constitution, because the result hap- 
pened under the Constitution. But they have honor 
and interests to preserve, and there is nothing in the 
nature of mankind or in the character of that peo- 
ple to induce an expectation that they, loyal as they 
are, are insensible to the duty of defending them. 
But the scheme would still be impracticable, even if 
this difnculty were overcome. What is proposed is 
apolitkat equilibrium. Every political equilibrium 
requires a physical equilibrium to rest upon, and is 
valueless without it. To constitute a physical equi- 
librium between the slave States and the free States, 
requires first, an equality of territory, or some near 
approximation. And this is already lost. But it re- 
quires much more than this. It requires an equality 
or a proximate equality in the number of slaves and 
freemen. And this must be perpetual. 

But the census of 1840 gives a slave basis of only 
2,500,000, and a free basis of 14,500,000. And the 
population on the slave basis increases in the ratio 
of 25 per cent, for ten years, while that on the free 
basis advances at the rate of 38 per cent. The ac- 
celerating movement of the free population, now 
complained of, will occupy the new Territories with 
piorieers, and every day increases the difficulty of 
forcing or insinuating slavery into regions which 
freemen have pre-occupied. And if this were possi- 
ble, the African slave trade is prohibited, and the do- 
mestic increase is not sufRcient to supply the new 
slave States which are expected to jnaintain the 
equilibrium. The theory of a new political equi- 
librium claims that it once existed, and has been 
lost_^ When lost, and how ? It began to be lost in 
1787, when preliininary arrangements were made to 
admit five new free States in the Northwest Terri- 
tory, two years before the Constitution was finally 
adopted ; that is, it began to be lost two years be- 
fore it began to exist ! 

Sir, theequilibrium, if restored, would 1 e lost again, 
and lost more rapidly than it was before. The progress 
of the free population is to be accelerated by increased 
emiofration from Europe and Asia, while that of the 
slaves is to be checked and retarded by inevitable 
partial emancipation. "Nothing," says Montes- 
quieu, " reduces a man so low as always to see free- 
men, and yet not be free. Persons in that condition are 
natural enemies of the State, and their number.* 
would he dangerous if increased too high." Sir, 
the fugitive slave colonies and the emancipated 
slave colonies in the free States, in Canada, and in 
Liberia, are the best guaranties South Carolina has 
for the perpetuity of slavery. 



Nor would success attend any of the details ef 
the compromise. And, first, 1 advert to the pro- 
posed alteration of the law concerning fugitives from 
service or labor.- I shall speak on this as on all 
subjects, with due respect, but yet frankly and with- 
eut reservation. The Constitution contains only a 
compact, which rests for its execution on the States. 
Not content with this, the slave States induced 
legislation by Congress ; and the Supreme Court of 
the United States have virtually decided that the 
whole subject is within the province of Congress ; 
and exclusive of State authority. Nay, they have 
decided that slaves are to be regarded not merely as 
persons to be claimed, but as property and chattels, 
to be seized without any legal authority or claim 
whatever. The compact is thus subverted by the 
pr Jcurement of the slave States. Vt ith what reason, 
then, can they expect the States ex gratia to reas- 
sume the obligations from which they caused those 
States to be discharged 7 I say, then, to the slave 
States, you are entitled to no more stringent laws ; 
and that such laws would be useless. The cause of the 
inefficiency of the present statute is not at all the 
leniency of its provisions. It is a law that deprives 
the alleged refugee from a legal obligation not assu- 
med by him, but imposed upon him by laws enacted 
before he was born, of the writ of habeas corpus, and 
of any certain judicial process of examination of the 
claim set up ly his pursuer, and finally degrades 
him into a chattel which may be seized and carried 
away peaceably wherever found, even although exer- 
cising the rights and responsibilities of a free citizen 
of the Commonwealth in which he resides, and of 
the United States — a law which denies to the citi- 
zen all the safeguards of personal liberty, to render 
less frequent the escape of the bondman. And 
since complaints are so freely made against the one 
side, I shall not hesitate to declare that there have 
beeii even greater faults on the other side. Relying 
on the perversion of the Constitution which makes 
slaves mere chattels, the slave States have applied 
to them the principles of the criminal law, and have 
held that he who aided the escape of his fellow-man 
from bondage was guilty of a larceny in stealing 
him. I speak of what I know. Two instances 
came within my own knowledge, in which Govern- 
ors of slave States, under the provision of the Con- 
stitution relating to lusitives from justice, demanded 
from the Governor of "a free State the surrender of 
persons as thieves whose alleged offences consisted 
in constructive larceny of the rags that covered 
the persons of female slaves, whose attempt at es- 
cape thev permitted or assisted. 

We deem the principle of the law for the recapture 
of fugitives, therefore, unjust, unconstitutional, and 
immoral: and thus while patriotism wi hholds Us 
approbation, the consciences of our people con- 
demn it. . . r- 

You will =ay that these convictions of ours are 
disloyal. Grant it for the sake of argument. They 
are. nevertheless, honest; and the law is to be e.xe- 
cuted among us. not among you ; not by u=, but by 
the Federal authoritv. Has any Government ever 
succeeded in chancing the moral convictions of 
its subjects by force"^? But these convictions imply 
no disloyalty We reverence the Constitution, a - 
though we perceive this defect, just as we acknowl- 
edge the splendor and the power of the sun, although 
its surface is tarnished with here and there an 
opaque spot. , . ,.. . 

Vour Constitution r.nd laws convert hospitality to 
the refugee from the most degrading oppression on 
earth into a crime, but all mankind except you es- 
teem that hospitalitv a virtue. The right of extra- 
dition of a fugitive from justiie is not adtiiitted by 
the law of naUire and of nations, but rests in volun- 
i tary compacts. I know of only two compacts 



6 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



found in diplomatic history tiiat adipitted extradi- 
tion OF SLAVES. Here is one of them. It is found 
in a treaty of peace made between Alexander Corn- 
nenus and Leontine, Greek Emperors at Constanti- 
nople, ;ind Oleg, King of Russia, in the year 902, 
and is in these words : 

"If a Russian slave take flight, or even if he is carried 
away by any one untler pretence of havins been bongUt, 
his master shall have the rijcht and power to pursue him, 
and hunt for and capture him wherever he shall be found ; 
and any person who shall oppose the master in the execu- 
tion of this right shall be deemed guilty of violating this 
treaty, and be punished accordingly.'' 

This was in the year of Grace 902, in the period 
called the " Dark Ages," and the contracting Pow- 
ers were despotisms. And here is the other : 

" No person held to service or labor in one State, under 
the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in conse- 
quence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged 
from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up. on 
claim of the party to whom such service or labor is due." 

This is from the Constitution of the United States 
in 1787, and the parties were the republican States of 
this Union. The law of nations disavows such com- 
pacts; the law of nature, written on the hearts and 
consciences of freemen, repudiates them. Armed 
power could not enforce them, because there is no 
public conscience t<j sustain them. I know that 
there are laws of various sorts which regulate the 
conduct of men. There are constitutions and stat- 
utes, codes mercantile and codes civil ; but when we 
are legislating for States, especially when we are 
founding States, all these laws must be brought to 
the standard of the laws of God. and must be tried by 
that standard, and must stand or fall by it. This prin- 
ciple was happily explained by one of the most dis- 
tinguished political philosophers of England in these 
emphatic words : 

" There is but one law for all, namely, that law which 
governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of human- 
ity, justice, equity, the law of nature and of n;^tions. So 
far as any laws fortify this primeval law. and give it more 
precision, more energy, more eflfect, bv tlieir declarations, 
such laws enter into the sanctuary and particiuate in the 
sacredness of its character ; but the m.an who quotes as 
precedents the abuses of tyrants and robbers, pollutes the 
very fountains of j\]stice, destroys the foundations of all 
law, and therefore removes the only safeguard against evil 
men. whether governors or governed ; the guard which 
prevents governors from becoming tyrants, and the gov- 
erned from becoming rebels." 

There was deep philosophy In the confession of an 
eminent English judge. When he had condemned a 
young woman to death, under the late sanguinary 
codft of his country, for her first petty theft, she fell 
dov/n dead at his feet : "I seem to myself, said he, 
to have been pronouncing sentence, not against the 
prisoner, but against the law itself." 

To conclude on this point. We are not slavehold- 
ers. _ We cannot, in our judgment, be either true 
Christians or real freemen, if we impose on another a 
chain that we defy all human power to fasten on our- 
selves You beheve and think otherwise, and doubt- 
lessly with equal sincerity. Wejudse you not, and 
He alone who ordained the conscience of man and 
its laws of action can judge us. Do we, then, in 
this conflict, demand of you an unreasonable thing 
in asking that, since you will have pronerty that can 
and will e.xercise human powers to effect its escape, 
you shall be your own police, and in acting ainong 
us as such you shall conform to principles indJspens^ 
able to the security of admitted rights of freemen ? 
If you will have this law executed, you must alle- 
viate, not increase, its rigors. 

Another feature in most of these plans of compro- 
mise is a bill of peace for slavery in the District of Co- 
lumbia ; and this bill of peace we cannot grant. We of 
Uie free States are, equally with you of the slave 
States, responsible for the e.xistence of slavery in this 



District, the field exclusively of our common legisla- 
tion. I regret that, as yet, I see little reason to hope 
that a majority in favor of emancipation exists here. 
The Legislature of New York, from whom, with 
great deference, I dissent, seems willing to accept now 
the extinction of the slave trade, and waive emanci- 
pation. But we shall assume the whole responsibility 
if we stipulate not to exercise the power hereafter 
when a majority shall be obtained. Nor will the plea 
with which you would furnish us be of any avail. If 
I could understand so mysterious a paradox myself, 
I never should he able to explain to the apprehension 
of the people whom I represent how it was that an 
absolute an.i express power to legislate in all cases 
over the District of Columbia was einbarrassed and 
defeated by an implied condition not to legislate for 
the abolition of slavery in this District. Sir, I shall 
vote for that measure, and am willing to appropriate 
any means necessary to carry it into execution. 
And, if I shall be asked what I did to embellish the 
capital of my country, I will point to herfreedmen, 
and say, these are the monuments of my munifi- 
cence ! 

If I was willing to advance a cause that I deem 
sacred by disingenuous means, I would advise you 
to adopt those means of compromise which I have 
thus examined. The echo is not quicker in its re- 
sponse than would be that loud and universal cry 
of repeal, that would not die away until the habeas 
corpus was secured to the alleged fugitive from bond- 
age, and the symmetry of the free institutions of the 
canital was perfected. 

I apply the same observations to the proposition 
for a waiver of the Proviso ot Freedom in Territorial 
charters. Thus far you have only direct popular ac- 
tion in favor of that Ordinance, and there seems even 
to be a partial disposition to await the action of the 
people of the new Territories, as we have compul- 
sorily waited for it in California. But I must tell 
you, nevertheless, in candor and in plainness, that 
the spirit of the people of the free States is set upon 
a spring that rises with the pressure put upon it. 
That spring, if pressed too hard, will give a recoil 
that will not leave here one servant who knew his 
master's will, and did it not. 

You will say that this implies violence. Not at 
all. It implies only peaceful, lawful, constitutional, 
customary action. I cannot too strongly express my 
surprise that those who insist that the people of the 
slave States cannot be held back from remedies out- 
side of the Constitution, should so far misunderstand 
us of the free States as to suppose we would not ex- 
ercise our constitutional rights to sustain the policy 
which we deem just and beneficent. 

I come now to notice the suggested compromise of 
the bouvdary behreen Texas and New Mexico. Tnfs 
is a judicial question in its nature, or at least a ques- 
tion of lesral risht and title. If it is to be compro- 
mised at all, it is due to the two parties, and to na- 
tional dignity as well as to justice, that it be kept 
separate from compromises proceeding on the ground 
of expediency, and be settled by itself alone. 

I take this occasion to say, that while I do not in- 
tend to discuss the questions alluded to in this con- 
nection by the honorable and distinguished Senator 
from Massachusetts, I am not able to agree with him 
in regard to the alleged obligation of Congress to ad- 
mit four new slave State=, to be formed in the State 
of Texas. There are several questions arising out of 
that subject, upon which I am not prepared to decide 
now, and which I desire to reserve for future consid- 
eration. One of these is, whether the Article of An- 
nexation does really deprive Congress of the right to 
exercise its choice in regard to the subdivision of 
Texas into four additional States. It seems to me 
by no means so plain a question as the Senator trom 
Massachusetts assumed, and that it must be left to 



CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM. 



remain an 'ipen question, as it is a great question, 
whether Congress is not a party whose future con- 
sent is necessary to the formation of new States out 
of Texas. 

Mr. WEBSTER. Supposing Congress to have 
the authority to fix the number, and tirne of election, 
and apportionment of representatives, &c., the ques- 
tion is, wiiether, if new States are formed out of 
Texas, to come into this Union, there is not a solemn 
pledge by law that they have a right to come in as 
slave States'? 

Mr. SEWARD. When the States are once form- 
ed, they have the right to come in as free or slave 
States, according to their own choice ; but what I 
insist is, that they cannot be formed at all without 
the consent of Congress, to be hereafter given, which 
consent Congress is not obliged to give. But I pass 
that question for the present, and proceed to say that 
I am not prepared to admit that the Article of the 
Annexation of Texas is itself constitutional. I find 
no authority in the Constitution of the United States 
for the annexation of foreign countries by a resolu- 
tion of Congress, and no power adequate to that pur- 
pose but the treaty-making power of the President 
and the Senate. Entertaining this view, I must in- 
sist that the coustitutionality of the annexation of 
Texas herself shall be cleared up before I can agree 
to the admission of any new States to be formed 
within Texas. 

Mr. FOOTE. Did not I hear the Senator observe 
that he would admit California, whether slavery was 
or was not precluded from these Territories 1 

Mr. SEWARD. I said I would have voted for the 
admission of California even as a slave State, under 
theextraordinary circumstances which I have before 
distinctly described. I say that now; but I say also, 
that before I would agree to admit any more States 
from Texas, the circumstances which render such 
act necessary must be shown, and must be such as 
to determine mv obligation to do so ; and that is 
precisely what I insist cannot be settled now. It 
must be left for those to whom the responsibility will 
belong. 

Mr. President. I understand, and I am happy in 
understanding, tnat I agree with the honorable Sen- 
ator from Massachusetts, that there is no obligation 
upon Congress to admit four new slave States out of 
Texas, but that Congress has reserved her right to 
say whether_those States shall be formed and admit- 
ted or not. "I shall rely on that reservation. I shall 
vote to admit no more slave States, unless under cir- 
cumstances absolutely compulsory. 

Mr. WEBSTER. What I said was, that if the 
States hereafter to he made out of Texas choose to 
come in as slave States, they have a right so to do. 

Mr. SEWARD. My position is. that they have 
not a right to come in at all, if Congress rejects their 
institutitms. The subdivision of Texas is a matter 
optional with both parties, Texas and the United 
States. 

Mr. WEBSTER. Does the honorable Senator 
mean to say that Congress can hereafter decide 
whether they shall be slave or free States 1 

Mr. SEWARD. I mean to say that Congress can 
"hereafter decide whether any States, slave or free, 
can be framed out of Te.xas. If they should never be 
framed out of Texas, ihey never could be admitted. 

Another objection arises out of the principle on which 
the demand for compromise rests. That principle 
assumes a classification of the States as North- 
ern and Southern States, as it is expressed by the 
honorable Senator from South Carolina, [Mr. Cal- 
houn,] but into slave States and free States, as more 
directly expressed by the honorable Senator from 
Georgia, [Mr. Berrien.] The argument is, that the 
States are severally equal, and that these two classes 
were equal at the first, and that the Constitution was 



founded on that equilibrium. That the States being 
equal, and the classes of the States being equal in 
rights, they are to be regarded as constituting an as- 
sociation in which each State, and each of these 
classes of States, respectively, contribute in due pro- 
portions. That the new Territories are a common 
acquisition, and the people of these several States 
and classes of States have an equal right to partici- 
pate in them, respectively. That the right of the 
people of the slave States to emigrate to the Territo- 
ries with their slaves as property is necessary to af- 
ford such a participation on their part, inasmuch as 
the people of the free States emigrate into the same 
Territories with their property. And the argument 
deduces from this ris;ht the principle that, if Con- 
gress exclude slavery from any part of this new do- 
main, it would be only just to set otYa portion of the 
domain — some say south of 36 deg. 30 min., others 
south of 34 deg. — which should be regarded at least 
as free to slavery, and to be organized into slave 
States. 

Argument ingenious and subtle, declamation ear- 
nest and bold, and persuasion gentle and winning as 
the voice of the turtle dove when it is heard in the 
land, all alike and altogether have failed to convince 
me of the soundness of this principle of the proposed 
compromise, or of any one of the propositions on 
which it is attempted to be established. 

How is the original equality of the States proved 1 
It rests on a syllogism of Vatlel, as follows : All men 
are equal by the law of nature and of nations. But 
States are only lawful aggregations of individual 
men, who severally are equal. Therefore, States 
are equal in natural rights. All this is just and 
sound. But assuming the same premises, to wit, 
that all men are equal by the law of nature and of 
nations, the right of property in slaves falls to the 
ground ; for one who is equal to another cannot be 
the owner or property of that other. But you an- 
swer, that the Constitution recognises property in 
slaves. It would be sufficient, then, to reply that this 
constitutional recognition must be void, because it is 
repugnant to the law of nature and of nations. But 
I deny that the Constitution recognises property in 
man. I submit, on the other hand, most respect- 
fully, that the Constitution not merely does not af- 
firm that principle, but, on the contrary, altogether 
excludes it. 

The Constitution does not expressly afflrm any- 
thing on the subject ; all that it contains is two in- 
cidental allusions to slaves. These are, first, in 
the provision establishing a ratio of representation 
and taxation ; and, secondly, in the provision relat- 
ing to fugitives from labor. In both cases the Con- 
stitution designedly mentions slaves, not as slaves, 
much less as chattels, but as persons. That this re- 
cognition of them as persons was designed is histor- 
ically known, and I think was never denied. I give 
only two of the manifold proofs. First, John Jay, 
in the Federalist, says : 

" Let the case of the slaves be considered, as it is in 
truth, a peculiar one. Let the compromising e.xpedient of 
the Constitution be mutually adopted which regards them 
as inhabitants, hut as debased below the equal level of free 
inhabitants, wliich regards the slave as divested of two- 
fifths of the man." 

Yes, sir, of two fifths, but of only two-fifths; 
leaving still three-fifths ; leaving the slave still an 
inhabitant, a person, a living, breathing, moving, 
reasoning, immortal man. 

The other proof is from the Debates in the Con- 
vention. It is brief, and I think instructive : 

" August 28, 1787.— Mr. Butler and Mr. Pincknet mov- 
ed to require fugitive slaves and servants to be delivered 
up like convicts. 

■'Mr. Wilson. This would oblige the Executive of the 
State to do it at public expense. 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



"Mr. Shekman saw no more propriety in the public 
seizing and surrendering a slave or a servant than a horse. 

" Mr. Butler with(h-e\v his proposition, in order that 
some particular provision might be made apart from this 
article. 

"■ August 09.— ^Ir. Butler moved to insert after article 
15 : ' It any person bound to service or labor in any of the 
United States shall escape into another State, lie or she 
shall not be discharged from such service or labor in con- 
sequence of any regulation subsisting in the State to which 
they escape, but shall be delivered up to the person justly 
claiming their service or labor.' " 

•' After the engrossment, September I-j. page 550. article 
4, section 2, the 3d paragraph, the term ' legally ' was 
struck out, and the words 'under the laws thereof insert- 
ed after the word ' State,' in compliance with the wishes of 
some who thought the term ' legal ' equivocal, and favoring 
the idea that slavery was legal in a mured view " — Madison 
Debates, pp. 4S7, 4W. 

I deem it established, then, that the Constitution 
does not recognise property in man, but leaves that 
question, as between the States, to the law of nature 
and of nanons. That law, as expounded by Vafel, 
is founded in the reason of things. When God had 
created the earth, with its wond^erful adaptations, he 
gave dominion over it to man, absolute human do- 
minion. The title of that dominion thus bestowed 
would have been incomplete, if the Lord of all ter- 
restrial things could himself have been the property 
of his fellow-man. 

The right to have a slave implies the right in some 
one to make the slave ; that right must b'e equal and 
mutual, and this would resolve society into a state of 
perpetual war. But if we grant the'original equal- 
ity of the States, and grant also the constitutional re- 
cognition of slaves as properly, still the argument 
we are considering fails. Because the States are not 
parties to the Constitution as States ; it is the Con- 
stitution of the People of the United States. 

But even if the States continue as States, they 
surrendered their equality as States, and submitted 
themselves to the sway of the numerical majority, 
with qualifications or checks ; first, of the represen- 
tation of three-fifths of slaves in the ratio of repre- 
sentation and ta.xation ; and, secondly, of the equal 
representation of States in the Senate. 

The proposition of an established classification of 
States as slave States and free States as insisted on 
by some, and into Northern and Southern as main- 
tained by others, seems to me purely imaginary, and 
of course the supposed equiUbrium of those classes 
a mere conceit. This must be so, because when the 
Constitution was adopted twelve of the thirteen 
States were slave States, and so there was no equi- 
hbrium. And so as to the classification of States as 
Northern States and Southern States. It is the 
maintenance of slavery by law in a State, not paral- 
lels of latidude, that makes it a Southern State ; 
and the absence of this that makes it a Northern 
State. And so all the States save one were South- 
ern States, and there was no equilibriuiu. But the 
Constitution was made not only for Southern and 
Northern States, but for States neither Northern 
nor Southern— the Western States, their coming in 
being foreseen and provided for. 

It needs little argument to show that the idea of a 
joint stock association, or a copartnership, as appli- 
cable even by its analogies to the United States, is 
erroneous, with all the consequences fancifully de- 
duced from it. The United States are a political 
state, or organized society, whose end is government, 
for the security, welfare, and happiness"^ of all who 
live under its protection. The theory I am combat- 
ing reduces the objects of government to the mere 
spoils of conquest. Contrary to a theory so de- 
basing, the preamble of the Constitution hot only 
asserts the sovereignty to be. not in the States, but in 
the People, but also promulgates the objects of the 
Constitution : 



" We, the people of the United States, in order to form a 
more inorf perfect union, establish ;«i.7!V-e, insure domestic 
tranfjuiUity, provide for the common defence, promote the 
GENERAL WELFARE, and securc the blessings of liberty, do 
order and establish this Constitution.-"' 

Objects sublime and benevolent ! They exclude 
the very idea of conquests, to be either divided 
among States or even .enjoyed by them, for the 
purpose of securing, not the blessings of liberty, 
but the evils of slavery. There is a novelty in 
the principle of the compromise which condemns 
it. Simultaneously with the establishment of the 
Constitution, Virginia ceded to the United States 
her domain, which then extended to the Mississip- 
pi, and was even claimed to extend to the Pacific 
ocean. Congress accepted it, and unanimously de- 
voted the domain to freedom, in the language from 
which the Ordinance now so severely condemned 
was borrowed. Five States have already been or- 
ganized on this domain, from all of which, in pur- 
suance of that Ordinance, slavery is excluded. How 
did it happen that this theory of the equality of 
States, of the classification of States, of the equi- 
librium of States, of the title of the States to com- 
mon enjoyment of the domain, or to an equitable 
and just partition between them, was never promul- 
gated, nor even dreamed of by the slave States when 
they unanimously consented to that Ordinance 7 

There is another aspect of the principle of com- 
promise which deserves consideration. It assumes 
that slavery, if not the only institution in a slave 
State, is at least a ruling institution, and that this 
characteristic is recognised by the Constitution. 
But slavery is only one of many institutions there. 
Freedom is equally an institution there. Slavery is 
only a temporary, accidental, partial, and incongiu- 
ous one. Freedom, on the contrary, is a perpetual, 
organic, universal one, in harmony with the Consti- 
tution of the United States. The slaveholder him- 
self stands under the protection of the latter in com- 
mon with all the free citizens of the State. But it 
is, moreover, an indispensable institution. You may 
separate slavery from South Carolina, and the State 
will still remain ; but if you subvert freedom there, 
the State will cease to exist. But the principle of this 
compromise gives complete ascendency in the slave 
Stale, an! in the Constitution of the United States, 
to the subordinate, accidental, and incongruous in- 
stitution over its paramount antagonist. To reduce 
this claim for slavery to an absurdity, it i« only ne- 
cessary to add that there are only two States in 
which slaves are a majority, and not one in which 
the slaveholders are not a very disproportionate mi- 
nority. 

But there is yet another aspect in which this prin- 
ciple must be examined. It regards the domain only 
as a possession, to be enjoyed either in common or 
by partition by the citizens of the old States. It is 
true, indeed, that the national domain is ours. It is 
true it was acquired by the valor and with the wealth 
of the whole nation. But we hold, nevertheless, no 
arbitrary power over it. We hold no arbitrary au- 
thority over anything, whether acquired lawfully or 
seized by usurpation. The Constitution regulates our 
stewardship ; the Constitution devotes the domain 
to union, to justice, to defence, to welfare, and to 
liberty. 

But there is a higher law than the Constitution, 
which regulates our authority over the domain, and 
devotes it to the same noble purposes. The terri- 
tory is a part, no inconsiderable part, of the com- 
mon heritage of mankind, bestowed upon them by 
the Creator'of the Universe. We are his stewards, 
and must so discharge our trust as to secure in the 
highest attainable degree their hanpinei?s. How 
momentous that trust is, we may learn from the in.- 
structions of the founder of modern philosophy ; 



CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM. 



"No man," says Bacon, "can by care-takin?, as the 
Scripture saith, add a cubit to his stature in this Uttle model 
of a man's body ; but, in the great frame of kinsdoms and 
commonwealths, it is in the power of princes or estates to 
add amplitude and greatness to their kingdoms. For, by 
introducing sucti ordinances, constitutions, and customs, 
as are wise, tliey may sow greatness to their posterity and 
successors. But these thing."! are commonly not observed, 
but lelt to take their chance." 

This is a State, and we are deliberating for it, just 
as our fathers deliberated in establishinglhe institu- 
tions we enjoj'. Whatever superiority there is in 
our condition and hopes over those of any other 
" kingdom" or " estate" is due to the fortunate cir- 
cumstance that our ancestors did not leave things 
to " take their chance," but that they ''added am- 
plitude and greatne?s" to our commonwealth "by 
introducing such ordinances, constitutions, and cus- 
toms, as were wise." We in our turn have succeed- 
ed to the same responsibilities, and we cannot ap- 
proach the duty before us wisely or justly, except 
we raise ourselves to the great consideration of how 
we can most certainly " sow greatness to our pos- 
terity and successors" 

And now the simple, bold, and even awful ques- 
tion which presents itself to us is this : Shall we, 
who are founding institutions, social and political, 
for countless millions ; shall we, who know by ex- 
perience the wise and the just, and are free to choose 
them, and to reject the erroneous and unjust ; shall 
We establish human bondage, or permit it by our 
Sufferance to be established 7 Sir, our forefathers 
would not have hesitated an hour. They found sla- 
very existing here, and they left it only because they 
could not remove it. There is not only no free State 
which would now establish it, but there is no slave 
State, which, if it had had the free alternative as we 
now have, would have founded slavery. Indeed, 
our revolutionary predecessors had precisely the 
same question before them in establishing an organic 
law under which the States of Ohio, Michigan, Illi- 
nois, Wisconsin, and Iowa, have since come into the 
Union, and they solemnly repudiated and excluded 
slavery from those States forever. I confess that 
the most alarming evidence of our degeneracy which 
has yet been given is found in the fact that we even 
debate such a question. 

Sir, there is no Christian nation thus free to choose as 
we are, which would establish slavery. I speak on due 
consideration, because Britain, France, and Mexico, 
have abolished slavery, and all other European States 
are preparing to abolish it as speedily as they can. 
We cannot establish slavery, because there are cer- 
tain elements of the security, welfare, and greatness 
of nations, which we all admit or ought to admit, 
and recognise as essential, and these are the security 
of natural rights, the diffusion of knowledge, and 
the freedom of industry. Slavery is incompatible 
with all of these, and just in proportion to the ex- 
tent that it prevails and controls in any republican 
State, just to that extent it subverts the principle 
of democracy, and converts the State into an aris- 
tocracy or a despotism. 1 will not offend sensibili- 
ties by drawing my proofs from the slave States ex- 
isting among ourselves. But I will draw them from 
the greatest of the Europeon slave States. 
The population of Russia in Europe, in 

1844, was 54,251,000 

Of these were serfs . . . . 53,500,000 



The residue nobles, clergy, and mer- 
chants, &c. ... - 751,000 
The Imperial Government abandons the control 
over the fifty-three and a half millions to their own- 
ers, and these owners, included in the 751,000, are 
thus a privileged class, or aristocracy. If ever the 
Government interferes at all with the serfs, who are 
the only laboring population, it is by edicts designed 



to abridge their opportunities of education, and thus 
continue their debasement. What was the origin of 
this system ? Conquest, in which the captivity of 
the conquered was made perpetual and hereditary. 
This, it seems to me, is identical with American 
slavery, only at one and the same time exaggerated 
by the greater disproportion between the privileged 
classes and the slaves in their respective numbers, 
and yet relieved of the unhappiest feature of Ameri- 
can slavery, the distinction of castes. What but this 
renders Russia at once the most arbitrary despotisM 
and the most barbarous State in Europe ? And 
what is its effect, but industry comparatively profit- 
less, and sedition, not occasional and partial, but 
chronic and pervading the Empire. I speak of 
slavery not in the language of fancy, but in the lan- 
guage of philosophy. Montesquieu remarked upon 
the proposition to introduce slavery into France, that 
the demand for slavery was the demand of luxury and 
corruption, and not the demand of patriotism. Of all 
slavery, African slavery is the worst, for it combines 
practically the features of what is distinguished as 
real slavery or serfdom with the personal slavery 
known in the Oriental world. Its domestic features 
lead to vice, while its political features render it inju- 
rious and dangerous to the State. 

I cannot stop to debate long with those who main- 
tain that slavery is itself practically economical and 
humane. I might be content with saying that there 
are some axioms in political science that a states- 
man or a founder of States may adopt, especially in 
the Congress of the United States, and that among 
those axioms are these : That all men are created 
equal, and have inahenable rights of life, liberty, and 
the choice of pursuits of happiness. That knowl- 
edge promotes virtue, and righteousness esalteth a 
nation. That freedom is preferable to slavery, and 
that democratic governments, where they can be 
maintained by acquiescence, without force, are pref- 
erable to institutions exercising arbitrary and irre- 
sponsible power. 

It remains only to remark that our own experi- 
ence has proved the dangerous influence and ten- 
dency of slavery. All our apprehensions of dangers, 
present and future, begin and end with slavery. II 
slavery, limited as it yet is, now threatens to subvert 
the Constitution, how can we, as wise and prudent 
statesmen, enlarge its boundaries and increase its 
influence, and "thus increase already impending 
dangers? Whether, then, I regard merely the wel- 
fare of the future inhabitants of the new Territories, 
or the security and welfare of the whole people of 
the United States, or the welfare of the whole fam- 
ily of mankind, I cannot consent to introduce sla- 
very into any part of this continent which is now ex- 
empt from what seems to me so great an evil. These 
are my reasons for declining to compromise the 
question relating to slavery as a condition of the ad- 
mission of California. 

In acting iipo7i an occasion so grace as this, a re- 
spectful consideration is due to the argximents, 
founded en extraneous considerations, of Senators 
icho commend a course different from that ichich I 
have preferred. The first of these arguments is 
that Coiigress haw no power to legislate on the sub- 
ject of slavery within the Territories. 

Sir, Congress 7)ia!/ admit new States; and since 
Congress m°av admit, it follows that Congress may 
reject new States. The discretion of Congress in 
admitting is absolute, except that, when admitted, 
the State must be a republican State, and must be 
a State • that is, it shall have the constitutional 
form and powers of a State. But the greater in- 
cludes the less, and therefore Congress may impose 
cjndiiions of admission not inconsistent with those 
fundamental powers and forms. Boundaries are 
such. The reservation of the public domain is 



10 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



such. The right to divide is such. The Ordinance 
exchiding slavery is such a condition. The organi- 
zation of a Territory is ancillary or preliminary; 
it is the inchoate, the untiatire act of admission, and 
is performed under the clause granting the powers 
necessary to execute the express powers of the Con- 
stitution. 

This power comes from the treaty-making power 
also, and I think it well traced to the power to 
make needful rules and regulations concerning the 
public domain. But this question is not a material 
one now; the power is here to be exercised. The 
question now is, How is it to be exercised 1 not 
whether we shall exercise it at all, however derived. 
And the right to regulate property, to administer jus- 
tice in regard to property, is assumed in every Terri- 
torial charier. If we have the power to legislate 
concerning property, we have the power to legislate 
concerning personal rights. Freedom is a personal 
right ; and Congress, being the supreme legislature, 
has the same right in regard to property and person- 
al rights in Territories that the States would have if 
organized. 

The next of this class of arguments is, that the 
inhibition of slavery in the new Territories is unne- 
cessary ; and when I come to this question, I en- 
counter the loss of many who lead in favor of ad- 
mitting California. I had hoped, some time ago, 
that upon the vastly important question of inhibit- 
ing slavery in the new Territories, we should 
have had the aid especially of the distinguished Sen- 
ator from Missouri, [Mr. Benton,] and when he an- 
nounced his opposition to that measure I was in- 
duced to exclaim — 

Cur in theatrum, Cato severe, venisti ? 
An ideo, tantum, veneras ut exiresl 

But, sir, 1 have no right to complain. The Sena- 
tor is crowning a life of eminent public service by a 
heroic and magnanimous act in bringing California 
into the Union. Grateful to him for thi?, I leave it 
to himself to determine how far considerations of 
human freedom shall govern the course which he 
thinks proper to pursue. 

The argument is, that the Proviso is unnecessary. 
I answer, there, then, can be no error in insisting 
upon it. But why is it unnecessary 7 It is said, 
Jirst, by reason of climate. I answer, if this be so, 
why do not the representatives of the slave States 
concede the Proviso? They deny thai the climate pre- 
vents the introduction of slavery. Then I will leave 
nothing to a contingency. But, in truth, I think the 
weight of argument is against the proposition. Is 
there any climate where slavery has not existed 1 It 
has prevailed all over Europe, from sunny Italy to 
bleak England, and is existing now, stronger than in 
any other land, in ice-bound Russia. But it will be 
replied, that this is not African slavery. 1 rejoin, 
that only makes the case the stronger. If this vigor- 
ous Saxon race of ours was reduced to slavery while 
it retained the courage of semi-barbarism in its own 
high northern latitude, what security does climate 
afford against the transplantation of the more gentle, 
more docile, and already enslaved and debased Afri- 
can to the genial climate of New Mexico and Easte: n 
California? 

Sir, there is no climate uncongenial to slavery. It 
is true it is less productive than free labor in many 
northern countries. But so it is less productive than 
free white labor in even tropical climates. Labor is 
in demand quick in all new countries. Slave labor 
13 cheaper than free labor, and it would go first into 
new regions; and wherever it goes it brings labor 
into dishonor, and therefore free white labor avoids 
competition with it. Sir, I might rely on climate if 
I had not been born in a land where slavery existed ; 
and this land was all of it north of the 40th parallel 
of latitude; and if I did not know the struggle it has 



cost, and which is yet going on, to get complete 
relief from the institution and its baleful conse- 
quences. I desire to propound this question to those 
who are now in favor of dispensing with the Wilmot 
Proviso, Was the Ordinance of 1787 necessary or 
not? Necessary, we all agree. It has received too 
many eulogiums to be now decried as an idle and 
superfluous thing. And yet that Ordinance extend- 
ed the inhibition of slavery from the 37th to the 40th 
parallel of north latirude. And now we are told 
that the inhibition named is unnecessary anywhere 
north of 36 degrees 30 minutes ! We are told that we 
may rely upon the laws of God, which prohibit slave 
labor north of that lihe, and that it is absurd to re- 
enact the laws of God. Sir, there is no human 
enactment which is just that is not a re-enactment 
of the law of God. The Constitution of the United 
States and the Constitutions of all the States are full 
of such re-enactments. Wherever I find a law of God 
or a law of nature disregarded, or in danger of being 
disregarded, there I shall vote toreafRrni it, with all 
the sanction of the civil authority. But I find no 
authority for the position that climate prevents sla- 
very anywhere. It is the indolence of mankind in 
any climate, and not the natural necessity, that in- 
troduces slavery in any climate. 

I shall dwell only very briefly on the argument de- 
rived from the Mexican laws. The proposition, that 
those laws must remain in force until altered by laws 
of our own, is satisfactory ; and so is the proposition 
that those Mexican laws abolished and continue to 
prohibit slavery. And still I deem an enactment by 
ourselves wise and even necessary. Both of the 
propositions I have stated are denied with just as 
much confidence by Southern statesmen and jurists 
as they are affirmed by those of the free Slates. The 
popul ition of the new Territories is rapidly becom- 
ing an American one, to whom the Mexican code 
will seem a foreign one, entitled to little deference or 
obedience. 

Slavery has never obtained anywhere by express 
legislative authority, but always by trampling down 
laws higher than any mere municipal laws — the laws 
of nature and of nations. There can be no oppres- 
sion in superadding the sanction of Congress to the 
authority which is so weak and so vehetnently ques- 
tioned. And there is some possibility, if not a prob- 
ability, that the institution may obtain a foothold 
surreptitiously, if it should not be absolutely forbid- 
den by our ovn authority. 

What is insisted upon, therefore, is not a mere ab- 
straction or a mere sentiment, as is contended by 
those why waive the Proviso. And what is conclu- 
sive on the subject is, that it is conceded on all 
hands that the cflect of insisting on it prevents tho 
intrusion of slavery into the region to which it is 
proposed to apply it. 

It is insisted that the diffusion of slavery will not 
increase its evils. The argument seems to me mere- 
ly specious and quite unsound. I desire to propose 
one or two questions in reply to it. Is slavery strong- 
er or weaker in these United States, from its diffu- 
sion into Missouri? Is slavery weaker or stronger 
in these United States, from the exclusion of it from 
the Northwest Territory? The answers to these 
questions will settle the whole controversy. 

And this brings me to the great and all-absorbing 
argument that the Union is in danger of being dis- 
solved, and that it can only be saved by compromise. 
I do not know what I would not do to save the 
Union ; and therefore I shall bestow upon this sub- 
ject a very deliberate consideration. 

I do not overlook the fact that the entire delegation 
from the slave States, although they differ in regard 
to the details of compromise proposed, and perhaps in 
regard to the exact circumstances of the crisis, seem 
to concur in this momentous warning. Nor do I 



CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM. 



11 



•doubt at all the patriotic devotion to the Union 
which is expressed by those from whom this warn- 
ing proceeds. And yet, sir, although such warnings 
have been uttered with impassioned solemnity in 
my hearing every day for near three months, my 
confidence in the Union remains unshaken. I think 
they are to be received with no inconsiderable dis- 
trust, because they are uttered under the influence 
of a controlling interest to be secured, a paramount 
object to be gained ; and that is an equilibrium of 
power in the Republic. I think they are to be re- 
ceived with even more distrust, because, with the 
most profound respect, they are uttered under an 
obviously high excitement. Nor is that excitemsnt 
an unnatural one. It is a law of our nature that 
the passions disturb the reason and judgment just in 
proportion to the importance of the occasion, and 
the consequent necessity for calmness and candor. 
I think thev are to be distrusted, because there is a 
diversity of opinion in regard to the nature and ope- 
ration of this excitement. The Senators from some 
States say that it has brought all parties in their own 
region into unanimity. The honorable Senator from 
Kentucky [Mr. Clay] says that the danger lies in the 
violence of party spirit, and refers us for proof to the 
difficulties which attended the organization of the 
House of Hepresentatives. 

Sir, in my humble judgment, it is not the fierce 
conflict of parties that we are seeing and hearing ; 
but, on the contrary, it is the agony of distracted 
parties — a convulsion resulting from the too narrow 
foundations of both and of all parties— foundations 
laid in compromises of natural justice and of human 
liberty. A question, a moral question, transcending 
the too narrow creeds of parties, has arisen: the pub- 
lic conscience expands with it, and the green withes 
of party associations give way and break, and fall 
ofl' from it. No, sir ; it is not the State that ia dyinz 
of the fever of party spirit. It is merely a paralysis 
of parties, premonitory however of their restoration, 
with new elements of health and vigor to be imbibed 
from that spirit of the age which is so justly called 
Progress. 

Nor is the evil that of unlicensed, irregular, and 
turbulent faction. We are told that twenty Legisla- 
tures are in session, burning like furnaces, heating 
and inflaming the popular passion?. But these 
twenty Legislatures are constitutional furnaces. 
They are performing their customary functions, im- 
parting healthful heat and vitality while within their 
■constitutional jurisdiction. If they rage beyond its 
limits, the popular passions of this country are not 
at all, I think, in danger of being inflamed to ex- 
cess. No, sir ; let none of these fires be extinguish- 
ed. Forever let them burn and blaze. They are 
neither ominous meteors nor baleful comets, but 
planets ; and bright and intense as their heat may 
be, it is their native temperature, and they must still 
obey the law which, by attraction toward this solar 
centre, holds them in their spheres. 

I see nothing of that conflict between the South- 
ern and Northern States, or between their repre- 
sentative bodies, which seems to be on all sides of 
me assumed. Not a word of menace, not a vi'ord of 
anger, not an intemperate word, has been uttered in 
ths Northern Legislatures. They firmly but calmly 
assert their convictions; but at the same time they 
assert their unqualified consent to submit to the com- 
mon arbiter, and for weal or wo abide the fortunes 
■of the Union. 

What if there be less of moderation in the Legis- 
latures of the South 1 It only indicates on which 
side the balance is inclining, and that the decision 
of the momentous question is near at hand. I agree 
with those who say that there can be no peaceful 
dissolution — no dissolution of the Union by the 'se- 
cession of States; but that disunion, dissolution, 



happen when it may, will and must be revolution. 
I discover no omens of revolution. The predictions 
of the political astrologers do not agree as to the 
time or manner in which it is to occur. According 
to the authority of the honorable Senator from Ala- 
bams, [Sir. Clemens,] the event has already happen- 
ed, and the Union is now in ruins. According to 
the honorable and distinsuished Senator from South 
Carolina, [Mr. C.\l.houn,] it is not to be immediate, 
but to be develoijcd by time. 

What are the omens to which our attention is di- 
rected'] I see nothing but a broad difference of 
opinion here, and the excitement consequent upon it. 

I have observed that revolutions which begin in 
the palace seldom go beyond the palace walls, and 
they affect only the dynasty which reigns there. 
This revolution, if I understand it, began in this 
Senate chamber a year ago, when tlie representatives 
from the Southern States assembled here and ad- 
dressed their constituents on what were cabled the 
aggressions of the Northern States. No revolu- 
tion was designed at that time, and all that has hap- 
pened since is the return to Congress of legislative 
resolutions, which seem to me to be conventional 
responses to the address which emanated from the 
Capitol. 

Sir, in any condition of society there can be no re- 
volution without a cause, an adequate cause. What 
cause exists herel We are admitting a new State; 
but there is nothing new In that: we have already 
admitted seventeen before. But it is said that the 
slave States are in danger of losing political power 
by the admission of the new State. Well, sir, is 
there anything new in that? The slave States have iil- 
wavs been losing political power, and they always 
will be while they have any to lose. At first, twelve 
of the thirteen States were slave States; now only 
fifteen out of the thirty are slave States. Moreover, 
the change is constitutionally made, and the Govern- 
ment was constructed so as to permit changes of 
the balance of power, in obedience to changes of the 
forces of the body politic. Danton used to say, 
"It's all well while the people cry Danton and Ro- 
bespierre ; but wo for me if ever the people learn to 
say, Robespierre and Danton!" That is all of it, 
sir". The people have been accustomed to say, the 
South and the North ; they are only beginning now 
to say, the North and the South. 

Sir, those who would alarm us with the terrors of 
revolution have not well considered the structure of 
this Government, and the organization of its forces. 
It is a Democracy of property and persons, with a 
fair approximation towards universal education, and 
operating by means of universal suftrage. The con- 
stituent members of this Democracy are the only 
persons who could subvert it ; and they are not the 
citizens of a metropolis like Paris, or of a region sub- 
jected to the influences of a metropohs like France ; 
but they are husbandmen, dispersed over this broad 
land, on the mountain and on the plain, and on the 
prairie, from the ocean to the Rocky Mountains, 
and from the great Lakes to the Gulf; and this peo- 
ple are now, while we are discussing their imaginary 
danger, at peace and in their happy homes, and as 
unconcerned and uninformed of their peril as they 
' are of events occurring in the moon. Nor have the 
alarmists made due allowance in their calculations 
! for the influence of conservative reacaon, strong in 
; any Government, and irresistible in a rural Republic, 
■ operating by universal suffrage. That principle ot" 
: reaction is due to the force of the habits of acquies- 
1 cence and loyalty among the people. No man bet- 
i ter understood this principle than Machiavelli, 
\ who has told us, in regard to factions, that " no safe 
rehance can be placed in the force of nature and the 
I bravery of words, except it be corroborated by cus- 
I torn." Do the alarmists remember that this Govern- 



12 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



ment has stood sixty years already without exacting 
one drop of Wood '? that this Government has stood 
sixty 3'ears, and treason is an obsolete crime? That 
day, I trust, is far off when the fountains of popular 
contentment shall be broken up ; but whenever it 
shall come, it will bring forth a higher illustration 
than has ever yet been given of the excellence of 
the Democratic system ; for then it will be seen 
how calmly, how firmly, how nobly, a great peo- 
ple can act in preserving their Constitution : whom 
"love of country moveth, example teacheth, com- 
pany comforteth, emulation quickeneth, and glory 
exalteth." 

When the founders of the new Republic of the 
South come to draw over the face of this empire, 
along or between its parallels of latitude or longi- 
tude, their ominous lines of dismemberment, soon to 
be broadly and deeply shaded with fraternal blood, 
they may come to the discovery then, if not before, 
that the natural and even the political connections 
of the region embraced forbid such a partition ; that 
its possible divisions are not Northern and Southern 
at all, but Eastern and Western, Atlantic and Pa- 
cific ; and that Nature and Commerce have allied 
indissolubly for weal and wo the seceders and those 
from whom they are to be separated; that, while 
they would rush into a civil war to restore an imagi- 
nary equilibrium between the Northern States and 
the Southern States, a new equilibrium has taken its 
place, in which all tho'se States are on the one side, 
and the boundbss West is on the other. 

Sir, when the founders of the new Republic of the 
South come to draw those fearful lines, they will in- 
dicate what portions of the continent are 'o be bro- 
ken off from their connection with the Atlantic, 
through the St. Lawrence, the Hudson, the Dela- 
\yare, the Potomac, and the Mississippi ; what por- 
tion of this people are to be denied the use of the 
lakes, the railroads, and the canals, now consti- 
tuting common and customary avenues of travel, 
trade, and social intercourse; what families and kin- 
dred are to be separated, and converted into enemies; 
and what States are to be the scenes of perpetual 
border warfare, aggravated by interminable horrors 
of servile insurreclion. When those portentous lines 
shall be drawn, they will disclose what portion of 
this people is to retain the army and the nav}-, and 
the flag of so many victories ; and, on the other 
hind, wiiat portion of the people is to be subjected 
to new and ominous imposts, direct taxes, and forc- 
ed loans, and conscriptions, to maintain an opposins 
army, an opposing navy, and the new and hateful 
banner of sedition. Then the projectors of the new 
Republic of the South will meet the question— and 
they may well prepare now to answer it— What is 
all this for? What intolerable wrong, what unfra- 
ternal injustice, have rendered these calamities un- 
avoidable 7 What gain will this unnatural revolution 
bring to us? The answer will be : All this is done 
to secure the institution of African slavery. 

And then, if not before, the question will be dis- 
•^"^^^d, \\ hat is this institution of slavery, that it 
should cause these unparalleled sacrifices and these 
disastrous afflictions ? And this will be the answer : 
When the Spaniards, few in number, discovered the 
Western Indies and adjacent continental Ameri- 
ca, they needed labor to draw forth from its virgin 
stores some speedy return to the cupidity of "the 
court and the bankers of Madrid. They enslaved 
the indolent, inoff?nsive, and confiding natives, who 
perished by thousands, and even by millions, under 
that new and unnatural bondage. A humane eccle- 
siastic advised the substitution of Africans reduced 
to captivity in their native wars, and a pious princess 
adopted the suggestion, with a dispensation from the 
head of the church, granted on the ground of the 
prescriptive right of the Christian to enslave the 



heathen, to effect his conversion. The colonists o 
North America, innocent in their unconsciousness 
of wrong, encouraged the slave traffic, and thus the 
labor of subduing their territory devolved chiefly 
upon the African race. A happy conjunctnre 
brought on an awakening of the conscience of man- 
kind to the injustice of slavery, simultaneously 
with the independence of the Colonies. Massachu- 
setts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, 
Vermont, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylva- 
nia, welcomed and embraced the spirit of universal 
emancipation. Renouncing luxury, they secured 
influence and empire. But the States of the South, 
misled by a new and profitable culture, elected to 
maintain and perpetuate slavery, and thus, choos- 
ing luxury, they lost power and empire. 

When this answer shall be given, it will appear that 
the question of dissolving the Union is a complex 
ques'ion; that it embraces the fearful issue whether 
the Union shall stand, and slavery, under the steady, 
peaceful action of moral, social, and political causes, 
be removed by gradual, voluntary effort, and with 
compensation, or whether the Union shall be dis- 
solved, and civil wars ensue, bringing on violent bt^,t 
complete and immediate emancipation. We are now 
arrived at that stage of our national progress when 
that crisis can be foreseen, when we must foresee it. 
It is directly before us. Its shadow is upon us. It 
darkens the legislative halls, the temples of worship, 
and the home and the hearth. Every question, po- 
litical, civil, or ecclesiastical, however foreign to the 
subject of slavery, brings up slavery as an incident,, 
and the incident supplants the principal question. 
We hear of nothing but slavery, and we can talk of 
nothing but slavery. And now, it seems to me that 
all our difficulties, embarrassments, and dangers^ 
arise, not out of unlawful perversions of the ques- 
tion of slavery, a= some suppose, but from the want 
of moral courage to meet this question of emancipa- 
tion as we ought. Consequently, we hear on one 
side demands — absurd, indeed, but yet unceasing — 
for an immediate and unconditional abolition of sla- 
very, as if any power, except the people of the slave 
States, could abolish it, and as if they could be moved 
to abolish it by merely sounding the trumpet vio- 
lently and proclaiming emancipation, while the in- 
stitution is interwoven with all their social and 
political interests, constitutions, and customs. 

On the other hand, our statesmen say that "sla- 
very has always existed, and, for aught they know 
or can do, it always must exist. God permitted it, 
and he alone can indicate the w-ay to remove it." As 
if the Supreme Creator, after giving us the instruc- 
tions of his providence and revelation for the illumi- 
nation of our minds and consciences, did not leave 
us, in all human transactions, with due invocations 
of his Holy Spirit, to seek out his vvill and execute 
it for ourselves. 

Here, then, is the point of my separation from 
both of these parties. I feel assured that slavery 
must give way, and will give way, to the salutary 
instructions of economy, and to the ripening influ- 
ences of humanity; that emancipation is inevitable, 
and is near; that it maybe hastened or hindered; 
and that whether it be peaceful or violent, depends 
u on the question whether it be hastened or hinder- 
ed ; that all measures which fortify slavery or extend 
it, tend to the consummation of violence ; all that 
check its extension and abate its strength, tend to 
its peaceful extirpation. But I will adopt none but 
lawful, constitutional, and peaceful means, to secure 
even that end ; and none such can I or will I forego. 
Nor do I know any important or responsible body 
that proposes to do more than this. No free State 
claims to extend its legislation into a slave State. 
None claims that Congress shall usurp power to 
abolish slavery in the slave States. None claims 



CALIFORNIA, UNION, AND FREEDOM. 



13 



that any violent, unconstitutional, or unlawful meas- 
ure shall be enibracsd. And, on the other hand, if 
we offer no scheme or plan for the adoption of the 
slave States, with the assent and co-operation of 
Congress, it is only because the slave States are un- 
willing as yet to receive such suggestions, or even 
to entertain the question of emancipation in any 
form. 

But, sir, I will take this occasion to say that, 
while I cannot agree with the honorable Senator 
from Massachusetts in proposing to devote eighty 
millions of dollars to remove the free cc'lored popu- 
lation from the slave States, and thus, as it appears 
to me, fortify slavery, there is no reasonable limit to 
which I am not willing to go in applying the na- 
tional treasures to effect the peaceful, voluntary 
removal of slavery itself. 

I have thus endeavored to show that there is not 
now, and there is net likely to occur, any adequate 
cause for revolution in regard to slavery. But you 
reply that, nevertheless, you must have guaranties ; 
and the first one is for the surrender of fugitives 
from labor. That guaranty you cannot have, as I 
have already shown, because you cannot roll back 
the tide of social progress. You must be content 
with what you have. If you wage war against us, 
you can, at most, only conquer us, and then all you 
can get will be a treaty, and that you have already. 

But you insist on a guaranty asjainst the aboliiion 
of slavery in the District of Columbia, or war. 
Well, when you shall have declared war against us, 
what shall hinder us from immediately decreeiner 
that slavery shall cease within the national capital? 

You say that you will not submit to the exclusion 
of slaves from the new Territories. What will you 
gain by resistance 7 Liberty follows the sword, al- 
though her sway is one of peace and beneficence. 
Can you propagate slavery then by the sword 7 

You insist that you cannot submit to the freedom 
with which slavery is discussed in the free States. 
Will war — a war for slavery — arrest or even moderate 
that discussion ? No, sir ; that discussion will not 
cease; war would only inflame it to a greater height. 
It is a part of the eternal conflict between truth and 
■error — between mind and physical force — the con- 
flict of man against the obstacles which oppose his 
way to an ultimate and glorious destiny. It will go 
on until you shall terminate it in the only way in 
which any State or nation has ever terminated it — by 
yielding to it — yielding in your own time, and in 
-your own manner, indeed, but nevertheless yielding 
t® the progress of emancipation. You will do this, 
sooner or later, whatever may be your opinion now ; 
because naiijns which were prudent and humane, 
and wise as you are, have done so already. 

Sir, the slave States have no reason to fear that 
this inevitable chancre will go too far or too fast for 
their safety or welfare. It cannot well go too fast 
or too far if the only alternative is a war of races. 

But it cannot go too fast. Slavery has a reliable 
and accommodaiincr ally in a party in the free 
States, which, though it claims to be, and doubtless 
is in many respects, a party of progress, finds its 
-sole security for its political power in the support 
and aid of slavery in the slave States. Of course, I 
do not include in that party those who are now co- 
operating in maintaining the c:iuse of freedom 
against slavery. 1 am not of that party of progress 
in the North which thus lends its support to slavery. 
But it is only Just and candid that I should bear 
witness to its fidelity to the interests of slavery. 

Slavery has, moreover, a more natural alliance 
with the aristocracy of the North and with the aris- 
tocracy of Europe. So long as slavery shall 
possess the cotton-fields, the sugar-fields, and the 
rice-fields of the world, so long will commerce and 
capital yield it toleration and sympathy. Emanci- 



pation is a democratic revolution. It is capital that 
arrests all democratic revolutions. It was capital 
that in a single year rolled back the tide of revolu- 
tion from the base of the Carpathian mountains, 
across the Danube and the Rhine, into the streets of 
Paris. It is capital that is rapidly rolling back the 
throne of Napoleon into the chambers of the Tuile- 
ries. 

Slavery has a guaranty still stronger than these 
in the prejudices of caste and color, which in- 
duce even large majorities in all the free States 
to regard sympathy with the slave as an act of un- 
manly humiliation and self-abasement, although phi- 
losophy meekly expresses her distrust of the asserted 
natural superiority of the white race, and confidently 
denies that such a superiority, if justly claimed, could 
give a title to oppression. 

There remains one more guaranty — one that has 
seldom failed you, and will seldom fail you hereafter. 
New States cling in closer alliance than older ones 
to the Federal power. The concentration of the 
slave power enables you for long: periods to control 
the Federal Government with the aid of the new 
States. I do not know the sentiments of the repre- 
sentatives of California, but my word for it, if they 
should be admitted on this floor to-day, against your 
most obstinate opposition, they would, on all ques- 
tions really affecting your interests, be found at your 
side. 

With these alliances to break the force of emanci- 
pation, there will be no disunion and no secession. 
I do not say that there may not be disturbance, 
though I do not apprehend even that. Absolute 
regularity and order in administration have not yet 
been established in any Government, and unbroken 
popular tranquillity has not yet been attained in even 
the most advanced condition of human society. 
The machinery of our system is necessarily com- 
plex. A pivot may fall out here, a lever may be dis- 
placed there, a wheel may fall out of gearing else- 
where, but the machinery will soon recover its regu- 
larity and move on just as before, with even better 
adaptation and adjustment to overcome new obstruc- 
tions. 

There are many well-disposed persons who are 
alarmed at the occurrence of any such disturbance. 
The failure of a legislatire body to organize is to 
their apprehension a fearful nmen, and an extra-con- 
stitutional assemblage to consult upon public affairs 
is with them cause for desperation. Even Senators 
speak of the Union as if it existed only by consent, 
and, as it seems to be implied, by the assent of the 
Legislatures of the States. On the contrary, the 
Union was not founded in voluntary choice, nor does 
it exist by voluntary consent. 

A Union was proposed to the colonies by Frank- 
lin and others, in 1754 ; but such was their aversion 
to an abridgment of their own importance, respect- 
ively, that it was rejected even under the pressure of 
a disastrous invasion by France. 

A Union of choice was proposed to the colonies 
in 1775 ; but so stronsr was their opposition that 
they went through and through the war of Inde- 
pendence without having established more than a 
mere council of consultation. 

But with independence came enlarged interests of 
asrioulture — absolutely new interests of manufac- 
tures — interests of commerce, of fisheries, of navi- 
gation, of a couimon domain, of common debts, of 
common revenues and taxation, of the administra- 
tion of justice, of public defence, of public honor; 
in short, interests of common nationality and sov- 
ereignty — interests which at last compelled the adop- 
tion of a more perfect union — a National Govern- 
ment. 

The genius, talents, and learning of Hamilton, of 
Jay, and of Madison, surpassing perhaps the intcl- 



14 



SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



lectual power ever exerted before for the establish- 
ment of a Government, combined with the serene 
but mighty influence of Washington, were only suf- 
ficient to secure the reluctant adoption of the Con- 
stitution that is now the object of all our aflections 
and of the hopes of mankind. No wonder that the 
conflicts in which that Constitution was born, and 
the almost desponding solemnity of Washington, in 
his Farewell Address, impessed his countrymen and 
mankind with a profound distrust of its perpetuity ! 
No wonder that whil» the murmurs of that day are 
yet ringing in our ears, we have cherished that dis- 
trust, with pious reverence, as a national and patri- 
otic sentiment! 

But it is time to prevent the abuses of that senti- 
ment. It is time to shake off that fear, for fear is al- 
ways weakness. It is time to remember that Gov- 
ernment, even when it arises by ctiance or accident, 
and is administered capriciously and oppressively, is 
ever the strongest of all human institutions, surviv- 
ing many social and ecclesiastical changes and con 
vulsions, and that this Constitution of ours has all 
the inherent strength common to Governments in 
general, and added to them has also the solidity and 
firmness derived from broader and deeper founda- 
tions in national justice, and a better civil adapta- 
tion to promote the welfare and happiness of man- 
kind. 

The Union, the creature of necessities, physical, 
moral, social, and political, endures by virtue of the 
same necessities; and these necessities are stronger 
than when it was produced — stronger by the greater 
amplitude of territory now covered by it — stronger by 
the sixfold increase of the society living under its 
beneficent protection — stronger by the augmentation 
ten thousand times of the fields, the workshops, the 
mines, an i tho ships of that society ; of its produc- 
tions of the sea, of the plough, of the loom, and of 
the anvil, in their constant circle of internal and in- 
ternational exchange — stronger in the long rivers 
penetrating regions before unknown — stronger in all 
the artificial roads, canals, and other channels and 
avenues essential not only to trade but to defence — 
stronger in steam navigation, in steam locomotion 
on the land, and in telegraph communications, 
unknDwn when the Constitution was adopted — 
stronger in the freedom and in the growing empire 
of the seas — stronger in the element of national 
honor in all lands, and stronger than all in the now 
s.ttled habits of veneration and affection for institu- 
tions so stupendous and so useful. 

The Union, then, is, not because merely that men 
choose that it shall be, but because some Govern- 
ment must exist here, and no other Government 
than this can. If it could be dashed to atoms by the 
whirlwind, the lightning, or the earthquake, to-day, 
it would rise again in ail its just and magnificent 
proportions to-morrow. 

This nation is a globe still accumulating upon ac- 
cumulation, not a dissolving sphere. 

I have heard somewhat here, and almost for the first 
time in my life, of divided allegiance — of allegiance 
to the South and to the Union — of allegiance to 
States severally and to the Union. Sir, if sympa- 
thies with State emulation and pride of achieve- 
ment cjuld be allowed to raise iip another sovereign 
to divide the allegiance of a citizen of the United 



States , I might recognise the claims of the State 
to which, by birth an(l gratitude, I belong — to the 
State of Hamilton and Jay, of Schuyler, of the 
Clintons, and of Fulton — the State which, with less 
than two hundred miles of natural navigation con- 
nected with the ocean, has, by her own enterprise, 
secured lo herself the commerce of the continent, 
and is steadily advancing to the command of the 
commerce of the sworld. But for all this I know 
only one country and one sovereign — the United 
States of America and the American People. And 
such as my allegiance is, is the loyalty of every 
other citizen oi the United States. As I speak, he 
will speak when his time arrives. He knows no 
other country, and no other sovereign. He .has 
life, liberty, property, and precious affections, and 
hopes for himself and for his posterity, treasured up 
in the ark of the Union. He knows as well and 
feels as strongly as I do that this Government is his 
own Government ; that he is a part of it ; that it 
was established for him, and that it is maintained by 
him; that it is the only truly wise, just, free, and 
equal Government that has ever existed ; that no. 
other Government could be so wise, just, free, and 
equal ; and that it is safer and more beneficent than 
any which time or change could bring into iis^ 
place. 

You may tell me, sir, that although all this may- 
be true, yet tlie trial of faction has not yet been 
made. Sir, if the trial of faction has not been 
made, it has not been because faction has not always- 
existed, and has not always menaced a trial, but be- 
cause faction could find no fulcrum on which to 
place the lever to subvert the Union, as it can find 
no fulcrum now; and in this is my confidence. I 
would not rashly provoke the trial; but I will not 
suffer a fear, which I have not, to make me com- 
promise one sentiment, one principle of truth or jus- 
tice, to avert a danger that all experience teaches 
me is purely chimerical. Let, then, those who dis- 
trust the Union make compromises to save it. I 
shall not impeach their wisdom, as I certainly can- 
not their patriotism ; bul indulging no such appre- 
hensions myself, I shall vote lor the admission of 
California directly, without conditions, without 
qualifications, and without compromise. 

For the vindication of that vote I look not to the 
verdict of the pass ng hour, disturbed as the public 
mind now is by conflicting interests and passions,, 
but to that period, happily not far distant, when the 
vast regions over which we are now legislating shalt 
have received their destined inhabitants. 

While looking forward to that day, its countless 
generations seem to me to be rising up and passing 
in dim and shadowy review before us ; and a voice 
comes forth from their serried ranks, saying, •■ Waste 
your treasures and your armies, if you wil! ; raze 
your fortifications to the ground ; sink your navies 
into the sea ; transmit to us even a dishonored 
name, if you must ; but the soil you hold in trust 
for us — give it to us free. You found it free, and 
conquereid it to extend a better and surer freedom 
over it. Whatever choice you have made for your- 
selves, let us have no partial freedom ; let us all be 
free : let the reversion of your broad domain descend 
I to us unincumbered, and free from the calamities 
'. and the sorrows of human bondage." 






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